HENRI MATISSE (after) Algue Blanche sur un Fond Rouge et Vert.
Color pochoir on cream wove Arches paper, circa 1950. 477x363 mm; 18 7/8x14 3/8 inches, full margins. Signed, dedicated, dated "53" and numbered 110/200 in pencil, lower margin. A very good impression.
The dedicatee is Denise Arokas, Matisse's nurse at the end of his life. Arokas was 19 years old when she was hired to work for the ailing Matisse. She had been "recruited" in Paris by Matisse's great muse, the Russian refugee Lydia Delectorskaya. Like Delectorskaya, Arokas also became a model for the artist--she was the inspiration for his famous collage La Tristesse du Roi, Musée National d'Art Moderne, Pompidou Centre, among other works.
The edition was not signed by Matisse but only numbered (see the following lot), thus this impression with the dedication and pencil signature is likely unique.
